Ellie narrowly misses MasterChef finals

The youngest of this year's MasterChef contestants, Ellie Paxton-Hall, has narrowly missed out on a spot in the season three finals week.

Ellie last night cooked against Alana in an elimination round after Dani decided, albeit with many tears, to use her immunity pin.

The judges challenged Ellie and Alana to "fix" dishes that they had failed with before and gave them the same time they had originally had to cook the dishes.

Ellie was given 75 minutes to create something better than the Spanish stuffed pepper she had previously prepared.

Alana had 45 minutes to improve on her lamb cutlets and poached spiced pears.

Ellie decided to toss out her previous idea and cooked a saffron creme caramel with a citrus salad, orange ice-cream and praline, while Alana stuck with her original recipe, convinced her "multi-tasking" skills would allow her to prepare them faultlessly.

The judges thought Alana's lamb cutlets were too fatty but had been cooked perfectly, and could find no fault with her pear dish.

They praised Ellie's ice-cream, but told her she had left pith on her orange segments and overcooked her creme caramel.

In the end, they decided to eliminate the 21-year-old student nurse, who went out crying but smiling and declaring the competition had changed her life.

"I feel like I have a new direction in life, a whole world of opportunities, and I can't wait to get out there," she said.

"I think that I've taken such a huge journey at such a young age, but I guess you don't really know what you're ready for until you do it."